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scuba888's review against another edition
5.0
It was hard for me to get into this book, because it reads like a dense history textbook, but I’m actually really into that and once I got focused I ended up loving it! The early chapters were also more difficult because I’m much more familiar with the history of modern cities given in later chapters. I learned a ton and am continuously fascinated by cities! The association of cities with vice, the use of public spaces like Roman bath houses, the effect of trade routes and new technologies, rebuilding (and how?) after the destruction of war, effects of disease, pollution, politics, and war on where and how we live, from skyscrapers to dense slums, the possibilities of how we can transform our cities to meet modern challenges— the history of cities is the history of humanity.
dasbooch's review against another edition
5.0
A highly readable and enjoyable intro to concepts in urban history. As someone who focused their masters degree on urban history, I thought this was a good place to start for understanding the relationship of humanity to the city. Ben Wilson explores a range of cities and each chapter has a specific concept or concepts that he explores on using one or more cities to illustrate. This book was not without its flaws, as Wilson focuses mostly on European and North American cities as well as Middle eastern cities only before the renaissance and was forced to make some generalizations since he was going through all of human urban history. Plus there were some concepts like the impact colonial management on a city and the negative effects of utopian urban planning that he mostly ignored. Overall however, it was a pretty strong book that I would recommend to those wanting to learn more about urban history as a good starting point.
masonrules9's review against another edition
5.0
This was actually way more interesting than I expected. Although he sometimes went on really long tangents that were only sorta related to the chapter, ESPECIALLY in the middle half of the book, which sucked.
lajacquerie's review against another edition
3.0
Good god did I struggle with this book, and I'm not sure why! The general topic is exciting—Wilson's chapters focus loosely on different themes and the city that he chooses to exemplifies them (Gastropolis-Baghdad, Cities of War-Lubeck, the Sociable City-London, Skyscraper Souls-New York City)—and there are plenty of charming nuggets of wisdom in here.
And yet... maybe that structure didn't serve as well as it could have; Wilson was also obliged to march quickly through time, and so sometimes his discussions would overlap and bleed. Gastropolis didn't focus 100% on Baghdad, since there is so much to be said about how cities prompt innovation in all things food (even now! Think of the food trucks!).
Same with the topics themselves... when describing how London provided a unique space for different classes to mix (coffee houses), the discussion of sociability spilled over into discussing the first semblances of stock exchanges. Necessarily so, I suppose: Lloyd's, as you may already know, started as a coffee house near the docks—where its patrons would have early news of trade ships that had arrived, or word of those lost at sea, influencing the rise and fall of the fortunes of those left on land. Still, that might be more properly thought of as a more economic topic.
In thinking about this review, Wilson did a good job of showing how interconnected humans and systems within a city are, both for better and worse. He's clearly a great fan of cities (and writes to good effect showing why you should be a fan of them too!), and showing how haphazardly their development has been over time. It was also interesting to see how small changes (and of such different stripes—political, social, technological, ecological, rarely the same thing twice) could have vast consequences, sometimes changing the balance of power around the world.
And again, I love a book full of good nuggets, like the detailed exploration of how old cities were literally built up/on top of themselves, and would sometimes go through a cycle of population, depopulation, and then rebirth. I found the section on suburbia to be especially fascinating, given how Wilson delved into how the USG incentivized our sprawl so heavily—in no small part because of the threat of nuclear attack! Now, as Wilson points out, our greatest threats may be more ecological and prompt a recentering... as this book shows, "how things are" is rarely like "how things were." Change is possible, even if we feel that something has "always been this way."
And yet... maybe that structure didn't serve as well as it could have; Wilson was also obliged to march quickly through time, and so sometimes his discussions would overlap and bleed. Gastropolis didn't focus 100% on Baghdad, since there is so much to be said about how cities prompt innovation in all things food (even now! Think of the food trucks!).
Same with the topics themselves... when describing how London provided a unique space for different classes to mix (coffee houses), the discussion of sociability spilled over into discussing the first semblances of stock exchanges. Necessarily so, I suppose: Lloyd's, as you may already know, started as a coffee house near the docks—where its patrons would have early news of trade ships that had arrived, or word of those lost at sea, influencing the rise and fall of the fortunes of those left on land. Still, that might be more properly thought of as a more economic topic.
In thinking about this review, Wilson did a good job of showing how interconnected humans and systems within a city are, both for better and worse. He's clearly a great fan of cities (and writes to good effect showing why you should be a fan of them too!), and showing how haphazardly their development has been over time. It was also interesting to see how small changes (and of such different stripes—political, social, technological, ecological, rarely the same thing twice) could have vast consequences, sometimes changing the balance of power around the world.
And again, I love a book full of good nuggets, like the detailed exploration of how old cities were literally built up/on top of themselves, and would sometimes go through a cycle of population, depopulation, and then rebirth. I found the section on suburbia to be especially fascinating, given how Wilson delved into how the USG incentivized our sprawl so heavily—in no small part because of the threat of nuclear attack! Now, as Wilson points out, our greatest threats may be more ecological and prompt a recentering... as this book shows, "how things are" is rarely like "how things were." Change is possible, even if we feel that something has "always been this way."
rossbm's review against another edition
informative
reflective
slow-paced
2.0
Didn't actually finish the book. Should have liked it, given that I am already a convinced urbanite and that I like history. However, the book was more of a sociiolgy book than history. The first chapter, the book about Ur the first city, was the most interesting. The book goes downhill from there. The chapters are supposed to be chronological, focusing on different cities throughout time. But the chapters also have themes, themes that don't really make a lot of sense. For the chapter on Rome, the author talks a lot about bathing. Sure, the Romans were known to like their baths. But is that really the most important or interesting thing to focus on when discussing Rome? For Paris, the author goes on and on about "flaneurs" and describes the impact of Haussmann's reconstruction of Paris by painful descriptions of paintings. Nothing about the military implications/public order implications of the wider boulevards?
There must be better books out there
There must be better books out there
tstorr's review against another edition
5.0
Tremendous read, pulling stories and narratives from across the globe. Wilson does a great job making the concept of the city not just a setting, but a character itself, who throughout the book twists and shapes societal norms and expectations to what we recognize today. Highly recommend to anyone looking to learn more about world history, but more so to those captivated by the human condition.